


Retrograde Christmas Cheer

by seademons



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Amnesia, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Childhood Friends, Childhood Trauma, Christmas Music, M/M, Memory Loss, Music
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-24
Updated: 2017-10-11
Packaged: 2019-01-04 22:26:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 16,912
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12177720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seademons/pseuds/seademons
Summary: When he woke up again, Christmas cheer, as if his eyes had never closed.





	1. Solfège

**Author's Note:**

> Playlist: [Retrograde Christmas Cheer](https://open.spotify.com/user/oliviazanini/playlist/2pf9FyCUqH6ugY6idtUare).

“Hark! how the bells, sweet silver bells, all seem to say, throw cares away.” 

He winced reflexively, his breathing hitching for a moment, but only for a quarter note, as the choir sang loudly, a few paces to his right, shaking his tympanum, the rest of his skull by proxy. His hands touched the piano, light fingertips pressed down on the keys, mindlessly, on their own, just at the right times, in the right sequence, playing out a tune so deeply ingrained into his brain, so ruthlessly etched into his subconscious that the notes ached from the basement of his trauma, like an echo reverberating through a damp room, from the core of his heart to the tip of his trembling hands. 

A#, A, A#, G. 

A#, A, A#, G. 

A#, A, A#, G. 

A#, A, A#, G. 

Repeating for sixteen nauseating measures. 

He sweated. The overhead spotlights were too warm on stage and his breathing was wrong inside of this dress shirt. His hair was up, up in a bun, too long now, at this point, as a desperate cry to separate his image from that one of ten years ago. Ten years ago, now! Even with hair in a beautiful, gorgeous, sparkling bun, his neck still felt warm, as if stifled, maybe by the collar of this shirt, maybe by his own throat. His forehead burned under the long, silver bangs that shielded his eyes in shadow.

“One seems to hear, words of good cheer, from everywhere, filling the air.” 

His heart beat off-tempo, too fast, presto, prestíssimo, but not taking the rhythm from his hands, not moving a muscle from his arms, because they played without a mind, without a brain, from memory. Muscle memory, the only kind he still had. He was sweating, and his hands trembled, his arms trembled, his entire body was shaking. He heaved, his fingers were a blur. His left hand only existed in peripheral. 

D, C, D, A#. 

D, C, D, A#. 

D, C, D, A#. 

D, C, D, A#. 

Ten years ago, this song had played on the radio. The tunes had been soft, flowing sweetly from the dashboard up front, through the whispered conversation of one faceless silhouette to another, and all the way to the back, where he sat with feet dangling off the cushion, legs too short yet to reach the bottom. The rhythm had felt soothing, as if caressing his ears, pulling him to hum along. Gaily they ring, while people sing, songs of good cheer, Christmas is here. The snowflakes had flown past something beautiful, out the windows, hitting the windshield with the soft grace of a plum. Not too much later and he would hit the windshield, too. 

“Merry, merry, merry, merry Christmas!” 

D, E, F#, G, A, A#, C, D, C, A#.

A#, A, A#, G. 

A#, A, A#, G. 

A#, A, A#, G. 

A#, A, A#, G…

The song had gotten louder, much louder, as he blacked out and came to, over and over, for what had felt like hours, with eyes lazy and unfocused, but ringing ears that picked up the tunes with precision, every note, every distinct voice in the choir screaming right into his brain. The snow fell, and began covering up the huge crack on the windshield with a lovely sheet of sparkling white, thin and beautiful, that cast delicate shadows upon himself. Above that, blinding orange that burned through his retinas. His head hurt from it, his eyes couldn’t stay open because of it, and soon the world spun into nothing but darkness, with voices in the foreground, singing merrily. 

“Christmas is here, bringing good cheer, to young and old, meek and the bold.” 

His foot tapped, not in tempo, not in counting, but by itself. His hands played, his eyes blinked, his nose breathed. His brain stirred. Memories flashed past, of a ruined holiday, a white hallway and educated ghosts that inhabited the same space as him, from time to time, in between spotlights. His parents crying, loud voices and no visitors. A teddy bear. Some IV’s. A long, restful night of sleep. The best he had ever had. When he woke up again, Christmas cheer, as if his eyes had never closed. Wreaths, garlands, hollies, swags, lights, socks, snowflakes and a hat. A hat just like Santa’s. All of it had been left jumbled up on his nightstand, but decorating the bed nonetheless, and the entirety of the room, as if waiting for him to reawaken. He had put the hat on, first thing, and hugged the bear, second. It smelled nice, of something long forgotten, so he kept it in bed with himself, waiting for the ghosts to return, to greet him with some breakfast. 

One of them poked their head in, and promptly dropped his breakfast on the floor.

A#, A, A#, G. 

His parents couldn’t take him home right away. His dad had a beard, now, and his mom looked to be a hundred years older, but her smile was brilliant, and his dad’s tears shone. They saw him every day for a week before taking him away to a house that wasn’t his own. His new room was big, and overlooked the backyard, the many flowers and trees that his parents had planted. Apparently, during the year that he slept, they had picked up gardening. The results were marvelous. Even his windowsills had tiny tulips in them! 

He had placed the bear by his new bed, looking out at the flowers during the day, and sleeping with him every night for five years. His parents didn’t much care for Filbert, or his sudden attachment to it, which was strange, because they had named it themselves, without consulting him first. He didn’t understand his mother’s insistence in thrashing Filbert, or his father’s cold stares at it, but he didn’t care for it, and would defend Filbert with his very being. His best friend.

It had been left behind at his parents’ house, now. If his mother hadn’t trashed it yet, then it sat on his bed. 

D, C, D, A#. 

His therapist had said that learning to play an instrument was supposed to help his brain somehow, make it easier to manage his memories from now on, and so he learned to play the piano, violin, cello, harp, harpsichord and lute. He still didn’t remember half of the years that preceded the crash, and with each new instrument, it felt as if he’d never relive that time of his life, but at least his vast collection of instruments allowed him to mope to illustrious, classical soundtracks, if nothing else. His fingers touched the keys with the practiced dexterity of Mozart’s possessed soul as the rest of his body shuddered violently from the tunes under his hands. 

The teacher interrupted the rehearsal with two palms up and an indoor tone, gracefully disrupting the choir into breaking voices before the quiet and causing Riku’s hands to pause immediately, his thoughts dissipating into thin air. Practice was over. 

As he left the theater, still in a sort of trance and not entirely back into his own mind, a boy called out to him. His feet stopped at once, sinking themselves into the snow with a soft crunching sound as he turned toward the voice. The sight presented to him was something out of a movie screen. This boy stood, immobile, forty or so feet away from him, wearing a shocked look to his delicate features that could’ve trumped any actor that Riku had ever seen on the big screen. Wide blue eyes stared at him as if he were an apparition, accompanied by a slack jaw that shaped a perfect O with his lips. This brunette was adorable. 

“Riku…?” 

The boy’s brows creased slightly, still in disbelief, while his legs started to close the distance between the two of them with heavy, dragging feet. Riku stood in place, simply watching the scene unfold, blinking surprisedly at it. 

“Yes?” 

The brunette came up to him, stopped before him, very close, way into his personal space, but, for whatever reason, he didn’t lean back. Didn’t put space between them at all. The boy touched his thick coat with tentative hands, shaky gloves pressed to the buttons over his chest. 

He frowned; this was far beyond confusing. 

No, no. It was delightful. 

“Riku, oh my God.” Voice breathless out of wonder, as if his beautiful blue eyes couldn’t have been trusted. This boy was something else; the sight left him winded. “I can’t believe it’s you.” 

“Um.” 

“C’mon, man!” A shout from a group of people, several paces down the way where this boy had just come from, reached them. “We’ll be late!” Laughter. This seemed to piss the brunette off; the kid closed his eyes shut and breathed in sharp through his nose, but only for a heartbeat. He looked up at Riku right after, wide eyes bluer than before. 

“I’m… I… I don’t know what to say. Do you remember me?” He almost sounded desperate, holding onto the lapels of Riku’s coat with both fists, holding firmly on, too, and oh, oh. Oh, no. 

Oh, shit. 

“I, uh.” 

Did he know this kid? He didn’t know this kid. He couldn’t possibly know this kid. His brain quickly scrambled for memories of the last time that he had gotten prominently drunk, sometime around November, at a party hosted by some Arts Major that he knew. Could they have met there? This guy didn’t look to be an Arts Major at all. If Riku had to guess, then nothing short of a STEM Major, even if a cute one at that. He was at a loss. And he didn’t sleep around, either. He didn’t  _ do _ that, he had hard lines that shouldn’t be crossed when socially engaged with a stranger, but, shit, maybe he had? Maybe they had, anyway? He was a man of picturesque taste, after all, and this boy was way up there. 

He swallowed. His lips parted to speak, to spew out some bullshit that would ruin this sentimental moment, surely, but a jackass down the way saved him the trouble. 

“C’mon, dude, hurry up! You’re driving, remember?” 

The boy shut his eyes again, groaning this time. He was fucking adorable. Riku watched with a frown as the brunette let go of his coat, and reluctantly stepped back, just once. 

“Will I see you again? Do you go here?” He pointed a gloved finger at the theater, making Riku glance at it briefly before fixing his eyes on two blues again. 

“Yes, all the time.” 

“Tomorrow? Tomorrow at nine, can I see you?” 

“C’mon, Sora, let’s go!” The kids down the way shouted again, causing Sora to shoot a hand up to his own chest, grabbing the coat that covered it, anguished. He looked abysmally reluctant to leave. 

“Sure, at nine.” Practice wasn’t until ten. “At nine.” 

Sora nodded, brows furrowed upwards as he stepped back once more. His friends kept shouting, so he finally made a move to actually go. 

“Okay. Thank you.” 

He watched Sora run off with a curious feeling in his chest. Not anything crude, just a sort of déjà vu, maybe. Yeah, a déjà vu. 

Maybe they  _ had _ met at that November party. 

Riku turned and resumed his walk to class, feeling less real than before. 

He wasn’t sure why, but that night, as he sat down in bed intended to tuck himself in, his arms did something else. Instead of pulling up the covers, they reached for his violin case resting against the headboard, in cahoots with his hands that picked it up and brought it to his neck. He rested it under his jaw, right hand on the bow, and left on the strings, and he played. His brain was perfectly blank, his eyes were closed, and his hands played by muscle memory. His ears were numb. 

A, G, A, F.

A, G, A, F.

A, G, A, F.

A, G, A, F.

He threw the bow across the room. It made a disgusting noise against the strings when he swiped it away from himself. 

He took a pill and dreamt of nothing. 

At nine sharp the next morning, he pushed the auditorium doors open. Nobody was supposed to be here at this hour, other than him and Sora, but he wouldn’t be very surprised to see his teacher or a couple of classmates practicing backstage. They were nowhere in sight, though, and the atmosphere along the numerous rows of empty seats was perfectly silent. Riku let the door close softly behind himself, and walked over to the coat hanger, to alleviate of gloves, earmuffs and scarf. Only when he turned back around did he notice two blues intensely watching him. He smiled. 

“Hey, Sora.” 

“Hey…” The kid sounded breathless again, looking at him all soft-eyed and enamoured. Not remembering him felt like a stab to the neck. Sora’s eyes roamed his figure from head to toe, taking him in with a glance that didn’t scream lust at the slightest, but something else, far untouchable, as if he were a Broadway star, or a music legend, blessing Sora’s time with his grace, his honorable presence. He honestly wasn’t sure how to feel about it. 

“How are you doing?” His tone was friendly, purely conversational as he walked over to the brunette and took the empty seat next to him. All seats were empty. 

Sora hesitated. His lips parted, but nothing left his windpipe, rendering a long second of silence between them, until he cleared his throat to break it. 

“I’m-I’m good, I’m great. What about you? What have you been up to?” 

“Um, I’m good, too.” A momentary image of himself throwing the bow at the wall the night before came to mind. He probably needed to fix it, now. “I’m great. Been practicing a lot for the concert these days; the songs are almost driving me crazy.” A weak laugh to drive the point away. Sora cocked a brow. 

“The concert? You’re… You play something?”

“Yes, I’m playing the piano for the choir this year.” 

“The piano, really?” Sora sounded incredulous, a bit amazed. A slow spread of a smile made itself present as he continued. “Since when?” 

“Since--” The crash. Since the crash. “Since I was twelve.” 

“Oh… That’s nice.” 

All of the cheerful excitement and light amazement from before promptly died on Sora’s tongue, being replaced by something more morose, almost disappointed, on the flip of a coin. Riku didn’t know what to make of it. 

“Uh, yeah. I guess it is. I play other things, too. Um, I played the violin last year, and the harp the year before.” 

“The harp, huh.” 

“Yeah.”

He felt hot under the collar, and he wasn’t even in a dress shirt this time. Maybe a pullover  _ and _ a hoodie, indoors, was pushing it. He slipped the hoodie off and hung it on the arm of his own chair. Sora watched him mindlessly, looking to be far off, his focus in another universe. Riku decided to keep talking, because that was all he could do in situations like this. Not that he had been in many quite this… Unique, but still. He talked when feeling nervous; it was an impulsive action that he honestly despised in himself. 

“What are you taking? Are you some sort of STEM Major? Pay me a drink if I’m right.” 

Sora glanced up at his face, successfully pulled out of his silent reverie, and smiled. 

“Damn, is it that obvious? I really thought I looked more artsy than boring.” 

“Don’t blame yourself, you’re a masterpiece.  _ I’m _ just good.” 

Sora laughed, and his cheeks flushed with it. He shook his head. 

“I guess I owe you that drink, huh. Can it be hot cocoa?” 

“Yes, I’d love that.” 

Was this flirting? 

“Are you free tomorrow night?” 

“Sure.” He was free every night. “Are you asking me out?”

Sora blushed. His round face looked adorable with color, a wide smile splitting it in half. 

“I just wanna know if you’d like to meet me at Starbucks tomorrow, so I can quit my debt with you, is all.” 

“Right. As friends, then.” 

Sora opened his mouth to reply, but didn’t. Instead, he just stared as the smile slowly dropped from his lips. He looked very torn over this topic, all of a sudden, as if the definition of their date or non-date was a crucial one to his life, that would dictate whatever happened next, that would plan out the entire course of their friendship in this exact moment, like a constellation up in the sky, or the lines on someone’s palm. If he were a computer, he’d be shutting down. 

“Uh… Um. You really don’t remember me, do you?” 

A pang hit his heart much alike the scalpel of a surgeon. He swallowed. 

“Ah… I’m so sorry… Was it two weeks ago at that Arts party?”

Sora shook his head minutely. He looked absolutely broken. 

“No. It’s fine, I’m just… I’m glad that you’re here. At all.” Voice soft with sincerity. Sora took his arm, looking up to meet with his eyes. “I missed you. I missed you so much, Riku, I… I thought…” He paused, then, immediately shut his mouth and glanced off to the side. Ran a hand through his hair, completely forgo whatever his previous point was. “We went to elementary school together.” 

“Oh, elementary school. Of course. Thunder Bay?” 

At that, Sora’s face turned into a mosaic of upsetting emotions, ranging from sadness to disappointment to betrayal, all scrunched up in his brows and the lines between them as his lips parted in a muted gasp. He didn’t say anything, so Riku cleared his throat. Might as well change the subject and avoid  _ another _ trainwreck. 

“Can I play you something?” 

Sora blinked, his features softened. His eyes shone with melancholy. 

“Sure.” 

Riku got up from his seat, and pulled Sora along by the hand that held his arm. They walked down the center aisle that crossed the auditorium over to where the piano and some chairs were still set from the day before. Sora held onto his hand with both of his own, in a firm grasp, squeezing a bit, as if Riku’s arm were a lifeline to his fast drowning. Riku passed him a concerned glance over the shoulder, but Sora’s eyes weren’t on him. They were on the piano upstage. 

“I’ve never seen a big one up close.” 

“Yeah, me neither, before I came here. Grand pianos are stupid expensive. We have an upright one at home.” 

They climbed the steps and undid their hands. Riku sat at the piano, pulled up the fall board, and had to stop his hands from immediately hitting the keys with the first thing that came to mind. They closed in loose fists instead, as he looked up at Sora, standing a couple of feet away, watching with a tearful expression. It sent a twinge right through his chest. He put a palm down to indicate the plentiful spot next to him on the bench. 

“C’mere, play with me.” 

“I can’t play.” 

“I’ll teach you.” 

Sora seemed reluctant, but approached the piano anyway, taking a seat by him. Riku scooted in close, right hand now hovering over the keyboard for demonstration. 

“Here, play these three keys like this.” 

G#, C#, E.

He removed his hand from in front of Sora, and had the boy mimic his playing, touching the right keys, but with the wrong fingers. He fixed Sora’s fingers for him, unaware of the tension in the brunette’s shoulders and the sweat on his brow. 

“There. Now, repeat the melody four times, adagio. Uh, that means slowly.” 

Sora did, and as the repeating notes blended beautifully into each other, a sort of recognition spread across his face. He had heard this one before, much alike everybody else. Riku smiled when their eyes met again. 

“Moonlight Sonata?” 

“Yes. Here, play the measure eight times, now.” He touched the keys again while speaking. “And then switch the G sharp,” touch, “For a natural A,” touch, “And keep going. I’ll do the left hand for you.” 

“Alright. How many measures for the one with the A?” 

“Just two. Then it’s A, D, F sharp twice,” touch, “And G sharp, C, F sharp once,” touch, “Then back to the first arrangement.” 

“Um.”

“It’ll be fine. You’ll get it in a minute, when you do it yourself. There, on three. Do the counting and I’ll follow you.” 

“Okay, um. One…” Sora positioned his right hand on the keyboard, passing a glance over at him. He nodded in response. “Two… Three.” 

Their hands pressed down on the keys together, playing out the first melody in perfect unison. Sora completed the eight measures, and one extra, before stopping completely. 

“Shit, I forgot. It’s A, right?” 

“Yeah.” 

“Why is your part so much easier than mine?” 

He laughed, but Sora didn’t follow. The kid looked playfully frustrated. 

“You’re only playing two keys at a time!” 

“Well, do you want to switch, then, and do the left hand instead?”

“Yes!” 

“Alright.” 

He got up from his seat, so Sora slid into it as he circled the bench and took the opposite end. His left hand rested behind the two of them, now, gripping the edge of the cushion, their thighs and shoulders brushing together. The closeness felt nice, almost intimate. He nodded at the left side of the keyboard. 

“Do both C sharps over there, that one right under your thumb, yes, and the other one closer to your pinkie, an octave down. Yeah, that. Do both together, then both B’s, just one and a half down. There. I’m the right hand, so you’ll be following me. Change when I complete four measures, then change to one down for two measures, then down to F sharp for another two. No, the F sharp is far on the left. No, no, yes, now make it sharp. There, and the other one, an octave down. Can you read a sheet?” 

“Do I look like I can read a music sheet?”

“I don’t know. Maybe you don’t play the piano, but you might play something else.” 

“Well, I don’t.” 

“That’s fine. Follow, on three.” 

“Wait! So it’s, uh, these, then these, then…  _ These _ , then these.” 

“Yes. See, the keys go, starting from here,” touch, “C, D, E, F, G, A, B.” Touching every single one, up the entire octave. 

“C, D, E, F, G, A, B.” Sora repeated. Riku nodded in agreement. 

“Yes.” He paused suddenly, turning to the brunette with a raised brow. “Is this boring you? We could do something else.” 

“No, this is fine. Go, lead. I’m ready.” 

“Alright.” 

They played the first twelve measures together, without need of a pause, since Sora seemed to be concentrating pretty hard in counting tempo and not missing his cues. The sight was heartwarming. Riku pointed out the next couple of notes for him, to keep the song going, and then the next three, pausing briefly to let Sora figure out the keys. It didn’t take long for him to lose interest in his own hand, though, and acquire interest in Riku’s instead. The right hand was the fun one, after all. 

“You know, I want to see you play this by yourself. It looks easy, but that’s only because we’re each only playing half of it.” 

“Sure.” 

He removed his left hand from where it rested, and reached it across Sora’s lap, to his side of the keyboard, easily continuing the melody from where they had left it off. Sora squinted. 

“You just happen to know this off the top of your head?” 

“Well, yeah. When you play a song enough times, you really just need to remember how the first notes go, and once you get the tempo down, you’re fine.” 

His hands continued on playing to the audience of one. Sora watched him pretty closely, not saying anything else, so he kept quiet, as well. He wouldn’t dare break such pure contemplation from the little brunette. He still wasn’t sure what this guy’s deal was, or what they were doing here, at the auditorium of all places, but Sora seemed attached to whatever memory he had of their time together in elementary school, and even though none of them came to mind, Riku wouldn’t break his heart over it. He just kept playing until the keys that he hit were uncertain, and the rest of the long piece escaped him. He paused then. 

“I don’t remember the rest. This piece is, like, fifteen minutes long. Actually, maybe a little less.” 

“Have you played it to the end?” 

“Yeah, but it’s been a while. Right now, all I can play are Christmas songs. I was serious when I said I’m going crazy from that.”

“Play Jingle Bells.” 

“For real?”

Sora laughed. It was so hearty and genuine that it got him laughing, too. 

“No, just play something fun! Whatever you wanna play, I don’t know. What’s the hardest one you can do?” 

“Well, you can make any piece stupid hard to play if you want to, but I guess… I guess the third movement of what we were just playing is pretty dumb.” 

“Really?” 

“Yeah, I mean. Just so you get an idea, it starts like this.” 

His hands flew across the keyboard, playing the song presto, but only the first few measures. He honestly couldn’t remember much of the movement, and without having practiced it multiple times beforehand, he’d never get it right, anyway. He threw both palms up in the air. 

“It’s dumb.” 

“Looks like you were just hitting random notes.” 

“Yeah, that’s almost how it sounds, too.” 

A momentary silence fell between them. Sora’s eyes dropped from the keyboard to Riku’s left arm, to how it touched the brunette’s right knee at the wrist. Riku noticed this, and moved his hand away. His right one met the piano, absently playing some keys as he wrecked his brain for what to say next. 

He actually had a lot to ask, but the fact that they had just met the day before pushed him to keep quiet about some questions. For example, why did Sora look so sad? Doe-eyed and heartbroken. It was really upsetting to see, not being able to do anything about it himself. His leg bounced, and he pushed C, A, G, F, C. Were they really such impactful friends in elementary school? Who even remembered anyone from elementary school? He could barely remember a single person from Thunder Bay. The only thing that he recalled from it were the awful uniforms that made him feel stupid, and the cast stand out. Kids signed it, but they weren’t his friends in the slightest. Maybe Sora had been among them and he had barely paid attention to that. 

C, C, A#, G, A.

His hand stopped. Sora was holding his left arm again, and his eyes dropped down to it, to Sora’s firm grasp on his wrist. He thought about flipping his hand over and doing so they were holding hands instead, but didn’t. Not sure why, but he just didn’t. He let Sora hold his forearm as his right hand resumed Jingle Bells. 

Nails sunk into the fabric of his sleeve.

“I have to go.” Sora whispered. He played another measure before stopping entirely.

“I’ll see you tomorrow night, then? For that cocoa.” 

“Could be tonight. I’m not doing anything after six.” 

His heart jumped. If this wasn’t a date, then Sora must’ve been blind. 

No, they were friends. They were friends. This was friendship. 

“Sure. Stop by the dorms when you can, I’m in room 106 B.” 

“What? No way. I’m 208 B.” 

“Upstairs?” 

“Yeah! God, I can’t believe I’ve never seen you before, and you live just one floor below me. I’ve been here for a _ whole year _ and this is the first time I run into you.” 

“You’re a sophomore? That’s cute. It explains a lot, too.” 

“Shut up, you’re just a year older than me. Don’t be an asshole about it.” Sora scoffed through a laugh, and got up from his seat, letting go of Riku’s arm in the process. “I’ll see you later.” 

Their eyes met in passing, and a grin came to him in response to it. 

“See you then.” 

Sora grinned back, before crossing the stage and hopping down the steps. Riku watched him walk down the center aisle, toward the exit double doors, but not reach them. He stopped by the last row of seats, where they had been chatting just a little while ago, and where Riku’s hoodie still hung over the arm of a chair. Sora approached it contemplatively, and took it, bringing it to his chest afterwards. He turned around to glance back at Riku, sitting still at the piano. 

“Can I give this back to you later?” Sora’s voice echoed softly through the auditorium, muted at the walls. “I won’t steal it, I promise. Please.” His tone was painful at the last word. Riku nodded.

“Sure. Take care, Sora.” 

Half a smile faltered on the brunette’s lips. 

“Thank you.” 

Sora didn’t put it on. He grabbed a coat from the hanger, wore  _ that _ over his clothes, against the snow outside, and walked out with Riku’s hoodie in hand. 

His eyes were glued on the heavy double doors that swung back closed, so quietly, without a single noise, as his hand found the keyboard by itself, and played.

C.

C, G. 

G, F. 

F, D. 

D, G. 

Dearly Beloved, really? He hadn’t played this song in years. Hadn’t finished composing it, either. 

Huh.

He removed his hand from the keyboard and got up to leave. 

By the end of the day, the snow had stopped falling, but the thick sheet covering the ground still remained, causing his boots to sink with every step. It had gotten colder, now that the sun had gone, and that one hoodie in Sora’s possession really would’ve made a difference. Riku hugged himself for another dozen feet, listening to the crunching of the snow and the muffled voices of his dorm, leaking through cracks from open windows and gaps under the doors. He watched the yellow of the lit up rooms while approaching the building, and found comfort in the prospect of warmth, only a few feet away. 

Sora was waiting for him by his bedroom door, carrying two foam cups in a cardboard support and wearing his hoodie. Their eyes met when Riku turned the corner, and a pair of matching grins accompanied each other’s sight. Sora couldn’t have looked more adorable if he wanted to. 

“Hey.” Riku greeted easily, in the middle of shrugging his overcoat off. “I wasn’t expecting you until later.” 

“Oh, should I come back?” 

“No, no, not at all. Please, come in.” He spoke while palming himself for his keys, and unlocking the door for the two of them. Sora walked in first, so he followed, swung the door closed after. 

Sora flicked the light on. 

“Nice room.” Spoken as the brunette glanced about, slowly meandering over to the single bed. 

“Thanks.”

Sora took a seat on the mattress while he hung his coat, scarf, and everything else, down to a thin pullover. He kicked his boots off, and had Sora do the same. 

“What did you do today?” The question was addressed to him, even though Sora’s eyes were on the foam cups in his hand. He took one, and reached the other over to him, in offering. Riku accepted it with a quick thanks before sitting down next to his guest. 

“We rehearsed, then went to class, then rehearsed again, and now I’m here.” A tentative sip. The drink was hot, but not scalding. It didn’t burn the roof of his mouth. “Did you put vanilla in this? It’s really good.” 

“Yeah, duh. Of course I did. Now, ask me about  _ my _ day.” 

“Oh, how was your day? I see you’re wearing my sweater.” 

He glanced Sora down during the last part, to further his point. That put a grin on the brunette’s face. 

“It’s not stealing if I give it back… Eventually.” A pause, and two matching grins mirroring one another. Sora continued. “Anyway, today I did a lot of math, lied about knowing how to ice skate, ditched last period and made us cocoa. I also couldn’t stop thinking about-about… Uh. Earlier today, you know. Like, when’s the festival? I want to watch it this year.” 

“It’s this Friday.” That made a shudder run up his spine. It felt like a reminder more than an answer, and, God, it was so soon, this upcoming Friday. Two days from now. His heart skipped a beat, his hands trembled. He changed the subject. “You can’t ice skate?”

Thankfully, Sora took the bait.

“No, I don’t have enough motor skills for that. Don’t rub it in.” 

He laughed, but Sora just gave him a playful glare, before breaking into another grin. 

“You’re pretty.” Sora blurted out all of a sudden. He nearly choked around his own laughter, but managed to simply cut it off instead, without making a mess of himself. His face was hot. 

“Uh, what?”

A smile still remained on his lips, despite himself. They stared at each other in silence, but only for a heartbeat. Sora looked very comfortable with this, with saying that in the first place, and maybe, because of his nonchalance, Riku found himself not overreacting about it, as he usually would have. Instead, his shoulders were relaxed and the atmosphere between them remained pleasant. Sora shrugged. 

“I forgot how pretty you are. Your smile is really nice.” 

His face burned. 

Suddenly, Sora’s angle wasn’t so blurry anymore. 

This  _ was _ flirting. 

And he was awful at it. Just the worst, really. It was embarrassing; truly a depressive sight whenever he attempted it. He was only good at making passes without realizing that he was doing that at all, and now that his terrible, awful, no good brain had caught up with the brunette, he found himself at a loss of words. Of what to do next. All he could manage was a shy smile in response to the compliment. 

“Thanks.” He sounded dreadfully awkward. So awkward, in fact, that he nearly winced at his own voice. 

At that, Sora’s smile faltered, and his eyes dropped back to the cup in hand. He seemed morose, again, out of the blue, and Riku couldn’t help but feel to be at fault for it. He gave himself a mental kick to the gut. 

“Hey, um…” He actually didn’t know what to say to that. In quick retrospect, he shouldn’t have started a sentence that he didn’t know how to end. No planning, all action. He was terrible at this. 

Sora didn’t look up at him; his attention was fixed on the foam cup between his hands, his brows creasing slightly in the middle, from his concentration. 

This felt familiar. Homey, somehow. The two of them, sitting next to each other like this, sharing a cup of hot cocoa as the cold wind whipped outside, past their windows. It was strange how someone that he had no recollection of could make him feel so at home, as if Sora’s presence came with a natural coziness to it that had him doubting his own memories, or lack thereof. He brought the cup to his mouth and blew into it, with a stirring mind, and a swirl of emotions consuming his chest. 

Incidentally, why was Sora’s mood always swinging back and forth between bright and gloomy? In one moment they were grinning and laughing and having a nice time together, and in the very next he was introspective, brooding over something that clearly gave him trouble. Riku couldn’t put a finger on it, and it was driving him up the walls. 

“Does this seem familiar to you?” He asked. Sora’s eyes immediately looked up at his own, wide, almost startled, but the boy didn’t say anything to that, so he felt in the need to elaborate. “Like, this here, right now, having cocoa with you. It feels familiar, like we’ve done this a million times before. You… I feel like I’ve known you for a hundred years, Sora. Are you an old spirit, here, to haunt me?” 

Sora grinned. “Maybe so, or maybe we’ve known each other our whole lives. Maybe we’re best friends, even.” 

“Are we?”

The grin faltered, waned, and died on Sora’s lips. A heartbeat passed before he replied, tone flat, lifeless. “No, I guess not.” 

Riku frowned. “Are you keeping something from me?” 

“No, it’s nothing.” 

“Sora--”

Sora got up from the bed and crossed the room, stopping just before the door, facing it, but not walking out entirely. His hands still grasped the foam cup in between them, favoring the warmth of the drink over the coldness of the knob. A defeated sigh, and he turned back around. 

“I’m sorry, Riku, I just… I can’t do this. I thought I could, but I can’t. It’s heartbreaking. I can’t be here.” 

As Sora spoke, he left the bed, too, slowly, watching his tiny guest the whole time while wearing a frown on his forehead, and with an anxious hammering in his chest. 

“Wait, what are you talking about?” 

“You. I’m talking about you being here, alive and breathing and, and, right here, right now. I can see you, and I can touch you, and you’re  _ him _ , you’re… Him… But you’re not… You’re not. You’re not him at all. You just… Look like him. You look so much like him, Riku, and I miss him so much. I miss  _ you _ so, so much, you have no idea. No idea.” 

Sora’s blues were glassy with tears that spilled down his cheeks as he spoke, shaking his head at the last part. He looked hurt, and it pained Riku to see it. He wished he knew what to do about it, or what to say, even, but he didn’t. Not even that. All he could do was watch Sora wipe the tears with the palm of his free hand and sniffle through his breathing. It was torturous. 

He walked over to the brunette with tentative steps. Sora didn’t stop him, didn’t even look to have been bothered by it. He approached. 

“Hey… It’s okay. I’m here. I don’t know what you’re talking about, but I’m here for you. It’s alright.” He literally had no idea what Sora meant, or who he was referring to that, apparently, shared Riku’s appearance, but if he could help this guy in any way, then he would. He absolutely would. He stepped closer to Sora and coiled both arms around him, visibly in sight, in case the brunette would rather that he didn’t. Sora let him hold him. 

The hug was firm, but sweet. Sora loosely wrapped both arms around him in response, and neither of them said another word, only enjoyed the warmth shared between them, and the familiarity that came with it. 

The side of his face was pressed to Sora’s head, his hair so soft despite the styled spikes, and his scent… Riku breathed in deep. This scent. He buried his nose into Sora’s hair, closing his eyes in the process, and clearing his mind of everything else. He knew this scent. It was so familiar, somehow. It strongly resonated with something carved deep within himself, something that he couldn’t figure out what it was, or put a name to it, like a word at the tip of the tongue but lost in the mouth. It was frustrating. He held Sora tighter, nose buried on the crook of his neck now, drawing a soft gasp from the brunette, all in an attempt to reach the unreachable, find the lost word. Sora’s free hand grabbed the back of his pullover out of reflex, and that was when it dawned on him just how inappropriate he was being. He pulled his face away at once, cheeks burning bright from shame. 

He felt dreadfully inadequate, and expected nothing but a shove from Sora, to break their embrace pronto, but that didn’t happen at all. Sora only glanced up at him, wide blues meeting wider greens, and said nothing. Just stared, probably doubting his sanity, and causing him to become quite torn between ceasing his own existence immediately or leaning down to seal their lips together. He quickly decided on the former and undid the hug himself. 

“Sorry.” 

Sora grabbed him by the elbows and pulled him back close. His blues were far more intense now than before. 

“It’s okay.” His voice edged on a whisper. Sora licked his lips and Riku almost fucking kissed him. “It’s fine.” 

Riku breathed out. He hadn’t realized to have been holding his breath in the first place. 

Sora slowly let go of him, and took his hand instead, pulling him back to the bed. They sat down again, next to each other, just as before. Sipping on the cocoa now felt like a cleanse, the end of a cycle. They drank in silence until the cups were empty. 

“I don’t want to go.” Sora confessed, quietly, into the space between them. Riku watched the softness of his eyes and the unhappiness on his lips and had to hold himself back from reaching across and touching his face, the dry tear-tracks on his cheeks, the rosy color of his skin. He grabbed his own knee instead. 

“Then stay.” 

Sora glanced up at him. The blue of the hoodie, peeking out from the inside of the actual hood, and snuggled up to Sora’s jaw, really brought out the hue of his eyes. Riku considered gifting it to him. 

“No, I won’t.” His voice was small, but certain, and even though the response was exactly what Riku expected, it still pained him. “Maybe, in another lifetime, I would.” 

It pained him a stupid amount. As a primary instinct, he reached over and took Sora’s hand. No thinking, no breaking eye-contact, no idea where this would lead. He just followed a feeling, and that was to keep Sora close. Sora didn’t seem at all surprised by it; took it perfectly in stride. 

Riku wondered just how close they used to be in elementary school. 

“Come by tomorrow.” It wasn’t a question, but it was too soft-spoken to have been considered a statement. It existed in-between the two. 

Sora swallowed, hesitated. He obviously didn’t want to. Riku held his hand tighter, persuasive, eyes just short of pleading. The bend was immediate.

“After six.” Sora agreed through a trembling voice. 

Triumph flourished in his chest, filling it up big, and making him want to kiss the brunette again. He didn’t, though. Of course he didn’t. He shut his eyes and exhaled long and let go of Sora’s hand. 

He really needed to stop thinking like that, or he’d lose a friend. The most curious friend he had ever made. 

“After six.” He repeated. “I’ll be here.” 

“No; I’ll see you at my door this time.” 

“Alright.” He agreed, and nodded, and as Sora got up to leave, he regretted not having kissed him goodbye. 


	2. Pas assez proche

There was a man, with a gruff voice, a low voice, not as deep as some people in the choir, but definitely on par with one or two of them, that day, in the car. There was definitely a man in the car, talking, behind the wheel. Someone he didn’t know. No, he must’ve known this man, if he had been in the man’s car, being driven around by this guy. He didn’t remember to have felt anxious, or scared, so he must’ve had a good time in the car, humming Carol of the Bells, until hitting the windshield with his face. Not his face, but his forehead, and the top of his head, and probably the rest of his body, too. He hadn’t even seen the other car, just the windshield approaching fast, very fast, and the music getting louder, splitting loud in his ears. The orange of the lamplight, and then darkness.

If he had been in a coma for a year after the surgery, then when did the cast come into play? Why was it there at all? He went to school with it, Thunder Bay. He wore it there and the kids signed it, drew on it, but didn’t befriend him. He remembered being looked at, and talked about, as if he were an alien, or carried some sort of lethal disease. He didn’t remember Sora being there. If they were a year apart, then Sora wouldn’t have been in any of his classes, anyway. He sincerely wondered how they knew each other, or if Sora had just been mistaking him for somebody else, a lookalike, this whole time. Maybe mixing some of the memories of this lookalike with Riku in his place. He didn’t know, but he was sure, dead sure, to never have met Sora before in his life. Never. He would’ve remembered someone so remarkable.

He kicked the snow at his feet. Didn’t want to go to practice this morning, even though his head screamed A#, A, A#, G. He pushed the double doors open anyway.

Maybe he and Sora really did know each other from another lifetime. He would never have considered this idea normally; it was absurd, irrational, and completely insane, but nothing else could explain their weird interactions yesterday, and the day before, otherwise. Nothing could’ve explained Sora’s odd behavior, and constantly swinging moods. Nothing that he knew of, or had any expertise in, so it must’ve been some sort of mystical power that brought their two old souls together again. It must’ve been. Maybe Sora clearly remembered their past life, but _he_ didn’t, and that was why Sora always looked so upset when they hung out. Sora expected something out of him that he couldn’t deliver, memories that he didn’t recall, and feelings that he didn’t harbor. If anything, Sora saw him as who he used to be, but he didn’t know who that person was. Who he used to be. That upset him.

On the way back to the dorms, as the sun set, he glanced at the one building on his left, far in the distance, casting a long shadow on the snow-covered ground. The ice rink. They could do that tonight. Sora had mentioned before that he didn’t know how to ice skate, but that was hardly an excuse to pass the rink up. Riku would hold his hand through it.

He stopped by his room for a quick shower and change of clothes before taking the stairs up one flight, down four sets of doors, and knocking on the eighth. Sora swung it open in a second, clad in pajamas and carrying Riku’s hoodie over one arm. The brunette grinned, but before he could say a word, Riku did it first.

“Get dressed, we’re leaving.”

Sora’s brows shot up to his forehead, his grin widened. “Oh, hello to you, too. Here, this is yours.” He reached an arm to him, offering the hoodie back. Riku took it hesitantly.

“You sure you don’t want to keep it?” It brought out the blue of his eyes.

“I’m sure. However…” Sounding playfully mischievous, Sora tugged on the sleeve of his cashmere sweater. “I’d take this one for returning the other. I’ll give it back, obviously.”

Riku raised a brow at him, but didn’t voice the question in his mind that screamed doubt if Sora actually had winter clothes to wear, or if this was his primary way of keeping warm, by getting his friends to lend him their wardrobe, piece by piece. Wordlessly, Riku pulled his sweater overhead, and handed it to the brunette, before fixing the collar of his shirt and redoing the bun atop his head. Sora watched him with sparkles in his eyes.

“Your hair is so long, now.” Sora commented, moving to slip the sweater on. Riku shrugged on the hoodie on the meanwhile.

“Yeah, going on too long, I think. I never wear it down anymore.”

“Why not?” Sora spoke while fixing the cuffs of his pajama top, hiding them under the sweater cuffs. Riku reached over and did the collar for him, running the back of his fingers along Sora’s skin. The passive casualty of it felt strikingly familiar, as everything else about the brunette.

“I don’t know. I don’t like how it looks on top of so many layers of clothes, you know.”

He should get it cut.

Sora nodded absently in reply, and reached around the door, to grab his overcoat hanging on the back of it. He slung it over an arm before toeing his boots on. The obvious pajama pants would be introduced to the world, Riku supposed. No shame in that.

“Where are we going?” Sora asked, ready to leave now. He walked out to stand by Riku in the hallway, pulling the door closed behind himself.

“You’ll see. I won’t ruin the surprise.”

Sora squinted suspiciously up at him, then took his hand, so naturally that it almost felt like being mistaken for somebody else, some unknown boyfriend or long-lost lover. It made his heart skip, but he held Sora’s hand back anyway, and accompanied him out the building.

“Is it a good surprise or a bad one?” Sora’s voice dissipated into the outside darkness, his feet displacing the snow with each step forward. Riku ran a thumb across his knuckles.

“Why would it be a bad one? Ever?”

“I don’t know. What if _you_ think it’s a good idea, but it isn’t?”

“Well.” Riku paused, eyes fixed on the building up ahead, not two hundred feet away. A nod toward it. “We’re going over there.”

“To the ice rink? I can’t skate, and you know that.”

“Yes, you can.”

“No, I literally told you yesterday that I can’t, and, anyway, isn’t this place closed by now?”

“No, it closes at eight.”

“Ugh.”

He smiled, turning to meet with Sora’s unimpressed blues.

“It’ll be fine, trust me. You’ll do great.”

The rink was deserted at this hour, with only a girl working behind the counter, in the corner, where shoes got exchanged for skates. They approached her for a quick moment before moving over to the rink.

Sora clung to the handlebars first thing, as if his feet had never met ice before. The skates seemed to be a hinderance for him, the same as soap on bathroom tiles. Dangerous. Riku reached a hand to him, which was snatched rather than taken. He had expected this sort of desperation from the brunette, and wasn’t startled by it.

“Sora, you’re being dramatic.”

“And _you’re_ being overconfident.”

At that, he grinned, but Sora just glared up at him in response. Their hands firmly held onto one another as Riku took the initiative to break inertia, and got them skating about. Sora let himself be towed along on stiff legs and trembling arms.

They circled the entire rink about four times, in total silence, before Sora decided to strike up conversation. Usually, Riku would be the one talking first, and, really, nonstop, but he had been trying to control that. Calm that down, stay in his own comfort zone. Stop bending himself backwards over trivialities that bothered nobody else but his own overworking nerves. Still, he couldn’t be more glad to see Sora speaking his mind, for once, perfectly unprompted.

“You’re not him, you know. You’re not… Him… But I like you anyway.” Sora spoke softly, pensively, before passing him an agreeable glance that matched his smile. Riku managed a smile of his own.

“I like you, too.”

Him? Him, who? Sora was clearly very much affected, infatuated, perhaps even enamoured by this mystery man who Riku unfortunately resembled in some shape or form, and for as much as he really, ardently wished to ask _who_ , who that was, he couldn’t manage it. He couldn’t get it out, it died halfway up his throat, every time. Was mystery man an ex-lover, a lost friend? If his multiple lifetime theory had _any_ founding, then, perhaps, this person might’ve been himself. His own past, dead, self, from a literal lifetime ago.

But if that was true, then what was it that they used to be?

Lovers?

He watched the simple contentment of Sora’s smile as they circled the rink for the dozenth time.

“I have a question.”

The sentence left him airily, almost lost to the muddy thoughts of his own convoluted mind. Sora passed him a glance.

“Are we soulmates? Were we in love in a past life?”

Whatever feeling of shame that he might’ve had for having voiced that was densely overshadowed by the constant nagging irritation in his veins. Sora looked pensive for a moment.

“That’s a heavy question to ask. Are you sure you can handle the truth?”

“I’m sure.”

“Well, you and I… We’ve always been very close, of course. I mean, how else would I know that you take your hot cocoa with vanilla? Or that you’re a year older than me? Or that you’re a Capricorn, Pisces rising?”

“Huh. So you’re not mistaking me for somebody else that you know.”

“No, of course not. I know exactly who you are.”

“That’s a little ominous.”

Sora grinned, holding his hand tighter. His blue eyes shone something beautiful.

“Don’t worry, I use my knowledge for good.”

“So, tell me. Since you seem to remember every single thing from elementary school, when did I wear a cast on my left arm?”

“Is this some sort of quiz?”

“Not unless you want it to be. I just can’t remember, like. I have trouble recalling some things that happened in the past, and the cast keeps coming back to me, but I don’t know why I had it. Do you remember that? It was green, I think, and kids drew on it.”

Sora’s grin was gone. His eyes were down at the ice, now, thoughtful, and brooding again. Riku tugged on his arm for attention, lightly, softly, but it didn’t stagger the brunette at all. Sora just shrugged.

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?”

“That’s what I said.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah.”

“But…” He paused. Nothing made sense anymore. “I thought you knew everything.”

“Clearly, I don’t.”

“Then how do you know my star sign and rising?”

“And that you love huskies, but prefer cats, and love winter, but hate snow, and your favorite color is blue, because…” Sora’s voice faltered, choked on itself, and didn’t resurface. Sora shrugged, keeping his eyes off to the rink ahead. “Whatever. Call it an educated guess.”

“These are very… Accurate… Guesses. Are you connected to the mystical? Do you read palms?”

“No, but I can read yours.”

“Really?”

“Yes.”

The break of inertia was messy, since neither of them fully knew how to do so without at least threatening to fall multiple times, so Riku grabbed onto the railing with a hand and leaned the back of his waist onto it, as well, to kill acceleration with friction and come to a stop. Sora simply hugged Riku’s midsection and allowed himself prone to the results of such elaborate endeavour. To their luck, it worked.

Sora stepped back to examine Riku’s palm. He held it in both hands, and ran the tip of his fingers along the lines, with eyes focused on them, and a perfectly blank expression. He glanced back up at Riku after a moment of careful study.

“It says, here, that you’re very creative.” Sora spoke while tapping his palm, then glanced back down at it. “You fall in love easily… You’ve been hospitalized for a long time… And your friends and family have your back. They love you a lot, and support you through thick and thin. Cherish them.”

His jaw set. The hospital comment had his heart racing.

How did he _know?_ It couldn’t have been another educated guess. No one from Thunder Bay knew about the crash, no one on Earth but his parents and the doctors who salvaged him knew about it. It hadn’t even reached the news; what kind of sick individual would find joy in watching the news channel on Christmas Eve, anyway? His stomach folded.

Sora looked back up at him with those sweet baby blues, and held his hand, normally, in one of his, entirely unaware of how one cavalier comment had so severely disrupted him. Yet, the softness of the brunette’s hand and the delicacy of his touch managed to keep Riku composed.

Maybe the love comment wasn’t so far off, either.

“Do you want to know about mine?” Sora asked, brows raised expectantly, his eyes bright. Riku nodded, still speechless, so the brunette continued. “It says I have plenty of energy, that I’m neck-deep in emotional crisis, and am not very interested in romance, but fate plays a big part in that.”

“Oh, emotional crisis, huh? Would never have guessed.”

“Sarcasm, really? Are we doing that, now? Because I could go off on your love life, if I wanted to, but I have manners.”

“Is that right? Then, please, go ahead. Read my love life to shreds.”

“Well, for one, it’s non-existent, which is sad, but I don’t blame you. I mean, I’m your friend, and I’m not going to, you know, judge you for your bad taste in men, and your equally bad taste in women, or for how much of a social outcast you are, with only, maybe, one real, meaningful friend, which is me, of course, because my words come from a place of love, not hurt, and I’m here, as your palm says, to support you and see you grow.”

He squinted. “Are you reading my love life or just talking about your own?”

“Very funny. How many relationships have you been in?”

“That’s not a question worth answering.”

“So, none. Depressive.”

“You talk as if you’re not on the same boat, here. If you had a significant other, would you really be in this rink with me, standing so close, holding my hand?”

Sora blushed, his eyes widened. He licked his lips before defending himself.

“So what? Friends can’t do that, now?”

He shrugged. “You tell me. I just don’t see a lot of friends asking each other out and holding hands all the time.”

“Well.” Sora paused, swallowed. “We’re clearly a different brand of friends.”

“Yeah, I have a name for that one.”

Sora pushed on his chest, softly, adding an inch between them. “I don’t want to hear it. Skate with me some more.”

Riku didn’t counter him. Instead, he let silence settle between them as they slid away from the handlebars, and resumed lapping the rink hand-in-hand.

“You should stop assuming I’m into you.” Sora commented a few, long, awful minutes later. Even though the topic wasn’t super great, Riku was accepting anything at this point. Anything but the quiet.

“Aren’t you?”

Sora gave him the quick side-eye. “No.”

“Sorry for assuming. It’s just that this ‘brand’ of friendship is usually reserved for…”

“I _said_ I don’t want to hear it.” Sora cut him off, loudly, curtly. He smirked at it.

Maybe changing the subject now would be prudent.

“So, what are you? Where do you come from? At this point, I’m more inclined to believe that you’re an alien, or, more accurately, a time-traveler, than a regular, powerless mortal, like the rest of us. I mean, how did you know…” No. End of sentence drafted immediately, he couldn’t get himself to say the word hospital outloud or any variation of it. He licked his lips. “How did you know my favorite color is blue?”

“Because you told me once. Mine is red, see? Opposites.”

“I never told you that.”

“Yes, you have, in the past. I’m from a time when we knew each other.”

He honestly couldn’t bring himself to believe that, and from the playful smile on Sora’s face, he would probably be better off that way.

“What else did I tell you in the past?”

“That you loved me.”

Their eyes met instantly, his heart pounding loud in his ears, and Sora’s playful smile now evidently mischievous. He could feel how wide his own eyes had blown in their sockets. The perfect tempo of his breathing was ruined.

“Shut the fuck up.” Voice winded, breathless. Sora chortled out a loud laugh in response to it so sudden that it almost caught him by surprise. He exhaled, still in shock, fingertips nearly digging into the back of Sora’s hand. The brunette wheezed.

“Your face!”

“Don’t say shit like that.”

Sora brought his free hand up to wipe at the tears prickling at the corners of his eyes. This was ridiculous.

“Sorry.” Spoken through a chuckle as Sora slowly came back down. “But what I said is true.”

“How?”

“You told me.”

He sighed. “Fine. I’m done playing this game.”

“What? You don’t believe that I’m a time-traveling wizard who knows you from another dimension?”

“I don’t know, Sora. I’m starting to think you’re not real, and I’m still at that November party, probably hallucinating this whole thing from whatever roofie that some ill-intentioned jackass dropped into my drink.”

Sora laughed.

“God, you’re so dumb. I missed you.”

He sighed again, his heart rate finally inching back to normalcy. “Whatever.”

They circled the rink a few more times before getting bored of it, and leaving entirely. Heavy feet stomped across the carpeted area over to some chairs so the skates could be removed.

“Did I meet you when I was blackout drunk?” He asked. It was the only theory that made any sort of sense, as to why Sora knew so much about him, acted so close to him, and yet he didn’t know the brunette at all. Sora shook his head. “No? Are you sure? Look, I’ve only been blackout drunk twice in my life, and both times were a while ago, which is enough time for you to miss me. Here, listen. The first time was at Sophie’s birthday party, two years ago. Sophie’s my friend, do you know her? She takes English? I guess not. Anyway, the second time was in Kairi’s apartment, last year, but if you don’t know Sophie, you probably also don’t know Kairi, and couldn’t have been in her apartment.”

“I was in high school two years ago, and I don’t know anyone by those names.”

“Oh, shit, that’s right. You’re so young.”

“One year younger than you. Too young?”

“You’re eighteen?”

“Nineteen. You forget you’ll be twenty in two weeks.”

He blinked.

“I shouldn’t be surprised that you know that. You even know my rising sign.”

Sora grinned, and got up from his seat, with skates in hand. He reached his free one for Riku to take, which he did, so absently, so naturally, that it almost scared him. They exchanged the skates back for their shoes and left the building.

“Can I sleep in your room tonight?” Sora asked, his voice just a speck in the vastness of the outside. Riku gave him a look.

“Is that another one of your ‘friends totally do this’ questions?” Air quotes with his free hand. Sora’s cheeks flared up in response.

“Yes! I’m not trying to sleep with you.”

“Look, Sora, I don’t know who raised you, but you can’t just invite yourself over like this. You can’t go out with me, and flirt with me the whole time, and then go back to my room for ‘friendly’ stuff. Like, did you listen to yourself just now?”

Sora rolled his eyes, cheeks still lit up, his hand a firm grasp on Riku’s.

“I _mean_ I have a sleeping bag, dumbass. I can sleep next to your bed, not with you.”

“God, do you have no self-awareness?”

“And could you _stop_ thinking with your _cock?”_

His brows shot up, his torso went upright with the suddenness, the startlingly loud, sharp tone of Sora’s usually soft voice. He didn’t say a single thing in reply to that, simply blinked the shock away from his face. Sora exhaled next to him.

“I’m sorry.” Voice quiet, low. Apologetic. Sincere. Sora ran a palm down his own face. “I’m sorry, I didn’t… This is just… I’ll miss you tonight, is all. Is what I meant.”

“Why are you so offended?”

“What?”

“You clearly love doing all of this couple stuff with me, so what part of me liking that back offends you? Am I actually supposed to believe that _this_ is due to platonic intent?”

Sora remained silent. His eyes dropped to the snow underneath their weight, and stayed there for the entire walk back to the dorms, without a single word from his lips. Riku didn’t push him, and Sora didn’t answer. They walked past the double doors, and over to his room, halfway down the hallway toward the stairs. Sora let go of his hand.

“Goodnight.” Sora’s voice was small and morose, as if in mourning, while he turned to leave right after, eyes never meeting Riku’s face. Riku reached for his arm.

“Wait, hold on.”

Sora pulled his arm away from reach, lifting his palms and shoulders in clear indication for Riku to leave him alone. He respected that.

“Goodnight, Sora.” He called out as the brunette took the stairs up, and away from view.

He couldn’t sleep that night, evidently. Too much bothered him all at once, clustered his mind, kept him from resting. He hoped Sora wasn’t mad at him, or that he had hurt Sora’s feelings, or, worse, ruined their friendship. Realistically, the latter probably wasn’t affected, not in the grand scheme of things, but he still hoped to not have fucked up. Sora was different, and interesting, and familiar, as impossible as that was, and he didn’t want to lose that. He already didn’t have too much, and losing Sora now would’ve been heartbreaking. Painful. Hopefully, their apparently ancient friendship would prevail over the odds.

Ancient since when, though? Sora didn’t go to Thunder Bay. They didn’t meet in elementary school. Sora wasn’t there after the crash, and he… Could he… Could he have been there before the crash? _Before_ the crash, at that other elementary school, that one, before they moved, before Thunder Bay, _that_ one. What was the name? Who went there? They must’ve met there, that was the only way. That was why Sora remembered him, and cared for him, and thought of him so platonically. He got out of bed, heart racing, legs a blur. He left his room before his thoughts had fully formed.

Knocking on Sora’s door in the dead of night, in cold sweat, with eyes wider than the moon, felt so familiar, so strangely familiar that it almost caused an epiphany to hit. Almost, almost. He was on the edge of a precipice but _couldn’t_ jump off. It felt binding, and he was suffocating. Sora opened the door a second before he imploded.

“I know you.” He spoke fast from the adrenaline, making the sleep and tiredness of Sora’s face dissipate immediately. The brunette watched him, speechless, wide-eyed. “From 2002 to 2007, what’s the school we went to? In Saginaw. What’s the name?”

“Handley.”

“Handley! Handley, yes, I met you there. We went there together, right? That’s why we know each other. I used to live there.”

The anxious excitement on Sora’s face slowly faded, his shoulders slumped. He breathed. “Yeah. Yeah, we went there.” He spoke tiredly, as if the sleep from a second before had caught up with him all at once. “Where did you move to?”

“We live in Alpena now. I don’t know, maybe my parents got tired of Saginaw.” Maybe they couldn’t handle it after the crash. Maybe every street turn, every highway exit, every grocery store corner reminded them of Christmas Eve. Riku didn’t have a single memory of that town.

“Yeah, maybe.” Sora’s voice was low as he touched his chest with a hand, eyes drifting off downward, surely in thought. He looked sad again. “I have to sleep, Riku. Goodnight.”

He put up a quick hand on the door to keep Sora from closing it.

“Hey, wait. Don’t you want to sleep in my room?”

“No, I really don’t.”

His brows lifted, his hand left the door. “Oh. Alright, then. Um. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Sora closed the door.

Thunder Bay wasn’t even an elementary school; it was junior high. He could’ve solved this riddle days ago.

Huh.

Maybe he really was losing his mind.


	3. La symphonie

The first thought that occurred to him in the next morning, as he looked at himself in the mirror, at his own trembling hands, and pallid face, whiter than a ghost’s, was that the the concert was only thirty-seven hours away, now. Thirty-seven fucking hours. He brushed his hair, put it in a ponytail, and threw the overcoat across his shoulders. Thirty-seven lightning fast hours ahead and he’d be up on that stage, performing to an audience again, for the ninth time now, third without his parents in the crowd. He missed them, honestly. Not having who to look for in a sea of faces was disappointing. It left him feeling empty, as if all of his effort had been to dozens of shapeless, nameless, clapping vessels that didn’t mean anything to him. Didn’t make him feel anything. He always bowed, and smiled, and couldn’t wait for the ovation to die down so he could finally leave. 

Would Sora really be there? 

He stuffed both hands into his pockets, feeling the cold wind hit his face. Hopefully, if he hadn’t completely ruined their friendship last night, Sora would be there, and he’d have someone to look for. Someone whom to dedicate all of his extensive practicing, and playing, and carving for. He wouldn’t forget the opening number so easily; hadn’t forgotten the lyrics in ten years, even if he wasn’t to sing them. He shivered. Winter was killer this year. 

After that… Home. Home for his birthday, home for Christmas. He’d get to see his parents again, enjoy their cooking again, revel in the warmth of his own house. He grinned despite the cold burning his face alive.

Just as the first rehearsal of the day wrapped up, Sora showed. Riku didn’t see him at first, with his attention on carefully pulling the fall board down, then fixing the order of the music sheets on the rack. The choir took their time leaving the stage, chattering amid themselves the whole time, the strings walking out from the opposite end, and the woodwind communing at the center. He had just finished setting the sheets down when Sora slid up next to him on the bench, and kissed him straight on the cheek. He had never experienced such pure shock before. His entire body froze for a whole, entire minute, which turned out to realistically be only half a second. He turned to the brunette with eyes wider than humanly possible. Sora was grinning genuinely at him. 

“You play really well, did you know that?” 

Sora’s voice fell into the background as he noticed the looks that the strings were giving him, the knowing smirks of the woodwind, and his teacher’s sly attention from the corner of her eye. He felt winded. They needed to leave. 

“Yeah, thanks.” He spoke hurriedly, getting up from his seat and pulling Sora along by the arm. Sora tripped, and the bench scraped on the wooden panels of the stage pretty loudly, but elegance was the furthest thought from his mind. He pulled Sora down the steps, the ones on the side of the stage, and walked up with him to the corner of the auditorium. He was a hair away from heaving. 

With his back to the stage, he breathed. 

Sora raised a brow, the shadow of a smirk on his lips. “What’s that all about?” 

“Nothing.” A sigh. “What did you want to see me for?” 

“Well, I missed you, and that’s reason enough, but I was actually thinking about what you said yesterday. You know, about our friendship, and how I keep calling it that. Um. I don’t know what else to call it, but this, well, this, you know what it is. I do, too, now, and I’m sorry for leading you on. I’m sorry for being such an idiot, I just… Need to get used to the idea, I guess. I mean, I never thought that you… You… Or us, even, would ever even happen, I don’t know. I’m blind. Can you kiss me?” 

His heart leapt for his throat. “What?”

“Kiss me.”

“No, before that. Us? You said there’s an  _ us _ happening, right now? At this very moment?” 

His heart was going off, his breathing was ragged, all over the place, uneven at best, and the heat on his face was scalding. He tugged on the collar of his shirt, wondered if the hoodie should come off. Sora blinked, his cheeks colored. 

“Oh… Isn’t there…?”

He looked upset, apologetic, the crease in his brows was telling enough. Riku grabbed him by the upper arms, staggered him back a step. He couldn’t fucking breathe. 

“No, there is. Of course there is. What am I talking about?” 

At that, Sora smiled, and, suddenly, he could breathe again. 

“Kiss me, then?”

He swallowed, his fingers dug into Sora’s arms to keep from trembling. A glance over the shoulder revealed most of the woodwind still chatting onstage, most of the choir gone by now, one of the strings left, and his teacher speaking with a violinist aside. His jaw set, he looked back at Sora. 

“Uh.” 

Sora raised a brow. “What? What’s the big deal? They’re not looking.” 

“No, I know, I just… I’d rather…” He shook his head. God, he was fucking terrified. A quick subject change to keep Sora talking would save his life. It could be anything, the first thing. “What made you change your mind?”

“Um.” Sora paused, and a heartbeat passed before he answered. “I just came to terms with the fact that you’ll never remember me, is all. So. We might as well start over, don’t you think?” 

“Oh.” That was a little upsetting. He felt at fault for that, even though he literally wasn’t able to help it. “I’m sorry.”

“No, it’s fine. I like you, this new you, anyway, and, and, I just, I don’t know. You like me, too, right?”

“Yeah, of course I do.”

“Then maybe we could start this by doing what we’re supposed to.” 

His heart skipped. He glanced back over his shoulder, at the stage. Fewer students, his teacher was still there. Sora grabbed the zipper of his open hoodie for attention, making him look back around. 

“If you have a problem with this, I’ll come back later.” 

He pulled Sora closer with the hands that dug into his arms and sealed their mouths together, stealing the last word right off of the brunette’s lips. The kiss was so firm that Sora’s head leaned back a bit and, naturally, his torso leaned forward, to compensate for it. His lungs were about to explode, his entire body was on fire, and his heart could’ve made a break for it at any moment now, with how fast it was beating. Sora’s lips were soft on his own as they kissed once, hard, uncouth, for a long, long moment, before breaking apart for only a millisecond. Time enough for Riku to check himself, and kiss Sora again, except softer this time around, sweeter, graceful now, but quicker, too. One four-four measure later and they were apart again. 

Sora heaved, their eyes met. Wide, blown, full to the brim, blacker than green or blue. Breath hitching, throat wordless. Riku let go of Sora’s arms and took a step back, to breathe, to calm down, to recompose himself. 

They must’ve looked like desperate lovers to the watchers upstage, and the thought alone made him inwardly cringe. He didn’t dare look over his own shoulder, now. 

Sora did it for him, though, and the look on his face was anything but telling. Almost as if nothing had registered in the first place. 

“Um.” Sora cleared his throat, then looked back up at him. “I’ll see you in your room later.” 

“Sure.” 

He watched Sora leave in a state of ghostly existence, floating two feet above his own body, entirely out of his own mind. Turning back around, the rest of the day was a blur. All that came to him in regards to it were the heat of his own fringe over his forehead, and how scalding hot it was to sit for hours under the spotlight onstage. The discomfort was more distracting than his screaming brain, which was to say something. A lot. 

When he got back to his room, he grabbed a pair of scissors and cut the fringe short. It was wholly out of his eyes, now. He could see both of them on the mirror, and it brought him back a while. A few years. He dropped the excess hair to the floor, took a random streak from the middle, and cut that short, too. Up to his neck. He was barely thinking, his mind fogged up and lost in the Antarctic as his hands started to move by themselves, to cut more. Much more. He singled out streaks in between his fingers and cut them all short, around the same length, silver hair falling down his sides in tufts until there was nothing else touching his shoulders. He stopped then. 

This haircut was a lot like the one that he had a decade ago. He put the scissors down, cleaned up the floor, and went take a shower. 

Sora knocked on his door not too long after, a few hours past six, which threw him off, but not completely. He had almost forgotten about their meeting, already in pajamas by then, in bed, reading something, the first thing on his night stand, when the knocking interrupted him with flooding memories. He put the book aside, jumped out of bed, fixed it as hurriedly as he could manage, and considered changing into regular clothes. Sora knocked again. Shit, he’d have to live this through in starry flannel pants. 

“Riku?” Sora called from the other side, his voice muffled by the wood. Riku crossed the room with two strides and swung the door right open. 

“Hey! Sorry.” 

Sora stared at him with wide, deer-like eyes for a long, long minute, in perfect silence, not saying a single thing. Awkward, terrible silence. They stood like that, staring at each other, for longer than Riku would’ve liked. The air was cold and his shoulders were tense. He finally took Sora’s arm, pulled him inside, and closed the door. 

“You cut your hair.” Sora deadpanned, then. Riku ran an absent hand through it. 

“Yeah, it was driving me crazy.” 

Much alike everything else in this past week. It felt as if he had been living in an alternate reality. 

There were stars in Sora’s eyes, though. In his big, wide blues, still staring vacantly up at Riku. That almost made him feel to be under the spotlight again. 

“God, you…” The words trailed off, got lost in Sora’s mouth. He shook his head, speechless. “Good job.” 

“Uh, thanks. I forgot you were coming over, actually, and don’t have anything prepared. I’m in pajamas.” 

He didn’t know why it felt so necessary to draw attention to that. Sora glanced him down in response to it, briefly, airily, looking back up at his greens again. 

“I have those pants.” Sora commented, his tone absent. He wasn’t fully here at all.

In retrospect, Riku should’ve changed. 

“So, what are we doing tonight? I feel like… Like… I could really use a big safe, right now, to come down on my head from the top of a building, you know? Like in those old cartoons? The recital is in twenty hours.” 

“Twenty hours! I’ll be on the front row.” 

“No, you can’t. That’s reserved for teachers, staff, and the like. You can sit in the middle. I’ll be looking for you.” 

“Really?” Sora grinned. He finally started to look like himself again, his consciousness merging back into his own body. “I’ll bring you a rose.” 

“No, please, I’m already nauseous. I’ll be sick all over the front row if you do.” 

“That nervous, huh?” 

“Can you tell?” 

Sora’s grin widened. He was entirely himself, now. He took Riku’s hand and pulled him to the bed, both of them sitting down on it. Their hands remained laced together. 

“Here’s to a successful recital.” Sora spoke around the grin before leaning over and planting a kiss to the side of Riku’s face. His soft lips made the skin there tingle something nice. 

It also pushed a question to spew out of Riku’s mouth before he could catch it. 

“Are we talking about earlier?” 

Sora stared at him. Nothing in his face was very well readable, at the moment, other than partial surprise. A second later, and he smiled cheekily. 

“Which part?” 

“You know the one.” 

“When you started freaking out about your friends seeing me there, talking to you?” 

“No, obviously not that.” 

“What was that all about, anyway?”

“It was nothing, and, look, they’re not my friends. I don’t talk to any of them. This isn’t what I mean.” 

“You mean the kiss.” 

“I mean the whole  _ us _ thing. Is that… What does that entail? What exactly is it that we’re doing here?”

“We’re… Um. I don’t know. I thought we… I thought we had something.” 

“Like what?”

Sora tensed up, his cheeks flushed. He didn’t look very comfortable to be having this conversation. 

“I don’t know.” His tone was small, and soft, very unsure of itself. He was obviously second-guessing himself. “I don’t have a label for it, Riku, I just know that I like it and I want it to keep going. I want to see where this leads.” 

“You know where it leads.” 

“No, I don’t.” 

Riku spared a brief, but pointed, glance at his own bed, spread out underneath the two of them, where they sat. He knowingly looked back at Sora. 

“You  _ know _ what the end goal is.” 

At that, Sora’s brows creased. He looked somewhere in between pained and betrayed. 

“You think I’m just here to sleep with you?” 

“No, I don’t know what you’re here for. That’s what I want to know.”

“Well, rest assured it’s not for that.” 

“Then what is it?”

“I don’t know! God, Riku, does it really matter? I just want to be here, with you, like this. Can I not have that?”

“No, sure you can, I just want to know what you’re expecting from me in return. I mean, is this platonic or not? Just tell me that.” 

“It isn’t.” 

“Alright, great. That’s all I needed to hear.” 

“But I’m not here to fuck, either.”

“Alright! I get it.” 

“Fine, then.” 

They both huffed in similar intensities, then fell silent. The crease in Sora’s brow slowly dissipated. 

“Doesn’t mean you can’t kiss me, though.” Small, low, almost flirty, and accompanied by a pointed look. Sora was fucking adorable. 

He leaned over, this time, without hesitation. 

Sure, this wasn’t standard, or very usual, at all, the way that they had met, the way Sora behaved, the way Riku was completely lost and confused throughout most of their conversations and general interactions. Actually, no, this last one was more commonplace than not, but, still. Sora was something of a mystery that, even with the whole reveal about knowing Riku from Handley, still lived cloaked in a series of unanswered questions, due to Riku’s lack of memory from that time. How inconvenient, that he should get involved with someone from that exact moment of his life, the only five years that he couldn’t recall. This was a strong bad juju, if anything. It bothered Riku more than he cared to admit it. 

Sora didn’t want to leave his room that night, evidently, as he never did, always very strongly adverse to spending his nights alone, so Riku let him stay over this one time, only because it was one of the last nights that they’d spend in town before the Holidays. Sora looked heartbroken over that, because, shit, after this Saturday, they’d only see each other again in two weeks? Personally, Riku found that to not nearly be enough time to spend with his loving parents, but Sora seemed to find it an eternity to spend away from him. He could get that; he’d miss Sora, too, it was just that, right now, he missed his parents more, and couldn’t very well relate. Sora got his point across, though. Riku saw where he had been coming from. 

It was upsetting, despite everything. 

Sora tucked himself into Riku’s single bed, as a joke at first, because he was too lazy to go upstairs and bring his sleeping bag down, so, to push the joke a step further, Riku squeezed his way beside Sora on the mattress, intended to annoy the brunette enough to have him fetch the sleeping bag. Since fate never seemed to work in Riku’s favor, or, at least, not as he had first intended it to, the two of them fit snuggled up together so comfortably well that neither one had the heart to break the embrace for a mat to be put on the floor. They fit so perfectly together that it sent an eerie sensation of intermingling déjà vus with destiny through Riku’s thought process, but never quite had itself sorted out. In the end, the unreachable sensation remained unreachable, unnamed and purely in the air; the lost word, again, was never found. Sora slept with his face buried on Riku’s neck, an arm slung over his waist, while Riku slept with his face right on Sora’s hair, an arm across his back, and dreams of what-might-have-beens. 

In the morning, he only managed to suppress a freakout because Sora was still in his bed. Otherwise, by this time, he’d already have had three nervous breakdowns and would’ve been sitting in the corner of the room, breathing rapidly into his own hands. 

The recital was in thirteen hours. 

Getting out of bed, making it, getting dressed, and groomed, and not forgetting his bag before leaving the room wasn’t difficult. None of that was the hard part, neither was the last rehearsal before the concert, or the multitude of preparations that he had to go through, all day, before time was up. That was all fine and good, he was an expert in all of it at this point, from previous experience. What truly got to him was his anxiety. That was the only thing, and it was tradition, every single time, now, to worry himself sick over the performance, to overanalyze his solo and doubt his own ability to play it without letting his nerves get the best of him. It had never happened before, and he had always performed spectacularly, but that didn’t rule out the possibility of a first failure. God, a first failure! He was about to fucking faint, and would have, if his palm hadn’t met a wall just in time. 

Breath. He needed breath. 

In, and out. One, two, three. 

_ One, _ two, three. 

_ A#, _ A, A#, G. 

_ A#, _ A, A#, G. 

**_A#,_ ** A, A#, G. 

**_A#,_ ** A, A#, G. 

“ _ Hark! _ how the bells,  _ sweet _ silver bells,  _ all _ seem to say,  _ throw _ cares away...” 


	4. Les souvenirs

The ovation was deafening, and the sound of clapping hands seemed to reverberate through the auditorium far louder than the choir and orchestra together. It vibrated across his chest, his pounding heart only growing more frantic by the second, as his wide grin hurt his cheeks and his clammy hands rested at his sides, in tight fists. At the command of his teacher, he bowed, alongside his companions, strings, woodwind, choir, and everybody else. He was hyperventilating, but, hopefully, that didn’t show. Adrenaline ran freely through his veins. They all stood upright once again, and his eyes immediately fell on a pair of blues, in the dead center of the crowd, just above a brilliant grin. He breathed in deep.

Butterflies ate his stomach whole.

Backstage was an infinite stream of good jobs, and well dones, and pats on the back, and thank yous, and you toos! He was in a sea of compliments, shooting and flying left and right, at all and every person that crossed paths with one another. It was nice, and warm, and finally allowed for a downtime to his own speeding heart. He sat down on a bench by his clothes, leaned his back on the wall, let his eyes close for a moment, and breathed. Deep in, once, and out. Sora’s image, grinning, clapping, cheering for him painted itself behind his eyelids, making him smile. He had done well, and it finally felt like so. He finally felt accomplished.

Outside, family members were reuniting with their young musicians, congratulating them, and taking them back home. Riku waved some of his friends goodbye while pushing through the ankle-high snow toward the dorms, tux in hand, and bag firmly strapped to his back. He made about ten feet from the auditorium before coming across Sora, sitting on the cement fence surrounding a garden, waiting for him. He looked cold, hands stuffed in his pockets and the hood of Riku’s hoodie on his head. At his sight, Sora jumped up to his feet, and ran to him. They met in a big, tight bear hug that staggered Riku back a step.

He had never felt so happy.

Sora squeezed him tight, then kissed his face, grinning the whole time, just about giggling in the process. Riku couldn’t help the splitting grin of his own.

“Congrats, Riku! You did so good, you did great! Awesomely! I’m so proud of you!”

“Thank you!” A kiss to Sora’s face. “Thank you so much.”

They squeezed each other once again before letting go, and taking each other’s hands instead. Riku resumed the walk back to the dorms with Sora at his side.

“You did so good, seriously. I loved Jingle Bells.”

“Thank you, I spent a lot of time overreacting about it.”

Sora laughed.

“I’m sure you did.”

The dorms were practically deserted by now, most of the students already having gone home, and the remaining few getting an early night’s rest for the long trip back in the morning. Riku was definitely one of them, and should’ve been getting ready for bed, if only the time spent freaking out about the concert had been invested into packing his things instead. His flight was at nine, thankfully, which left him with some time in the morning to double check everything. He pulled his suitcase from under the bed and neatly placed the tux inside, at the very bottom. He wouldn’t have to touch it for another six months.

“Are you going back tonight?” He asked Sora while emptying his closet. Sora leaned on the doorframe, twenty feet away, and watched him with a crestfallen glint in his eyes.

“No, tomorrow. You?”

“Tomorrow morning.”

Sora remained silent for a second longer, as if in contemplation of something, or pensiveness. He watched Riku fill up a suitcase and zip it securely closed.

“Since I won’t see you on Christmas, can I make you something? Consider it a present.”

“Oh, you don’t have to. If you do, you’ll make me feel bad for not getting you anything.”

“You can share your present with me. There’ll be enough for the both of us.”

With that, Sora left the room.

Riku finished packing what he wouldn’t immediately use to get ready tomorrow, and stored the full bags under the desk, on the meanwhile coming across his violin case. The cello, harp, etc. hadn’t been shipped over this semester, since he wouldn’t need them, and had remained at home. The piano, he used the grand one offered by the school, which rendered the violin as the only instrument of his that he had actually brought with himself in the plane. He picked up the bow, examined the hair, the structure, making sure that he toss from earlier in the week hadn’t damaged it. Some hairs had definitely broken off, but, overall, and given the violence of the situation, it wasn’t too bad. Not in critical condition, which he considered enough of a win for the time being. He packed the violin and stacked it with the other bags.

Sora wasn’t back yet, so he decided to go looking for him. Since the building was practically deserted, and the hallways felt eerier than the holy ground of a graveyard, it wasn’t difficult to figure out Sora’s secret location. If anything, the smell of baked pastry gave him away more than the lit up kitchen casting an orange glow to cut the darkness of the hallway. Riku walked over, his nose breathing in deep, and his mind stirring. Whirring. Working again, trying to reach the unreachable again. This scent, strong on the cinnamon, and easy on the vanilla, this scent… He knew it. He definitely knew it, but from where? Breathing in deep, once, he exhaled.

It was the smell of Christmas.

Inside the kitchen, Sora was placing the piping hot trays above the stove, closing the oven quickly afterwards. He dropped the mitts onto the counter.

This whole scenario felt familiar.

“Bring me a plate.” Sora told him, so he turned around to the overhead cupboards and brought down one of the bigger plates for serving. His movements were lethargic because this felt… Familiar still. Very much so.

Sora thanked him for it and proceeded to carefully pile up the cookies on it. Riku watched in something of an out of body experience.

“We’ve done this before.” He commented, very ghostly, hearing his voice echo from a thousand feet up in the air. Sora grinned at him, bright.

“Of course we have!”

Of course they had, on Christmas Eve, at Sora’s house. His big, three-story house, wooden from top to bottom, expensive and beautiful and spacious to fit all of his family and numerous relatives into. Of course they had, at ten years old, with Sora’s mother doing most of it, handling the oven and the scalding strays, but letting Riku set the table while Sora brought her the condiments. So much cinnamon, not enough vanilla, just how Sora’s dad liked it. His cousins, his aunts and uncles and grandparents. Many, many adults, all around, everywhere, and not enough cinnamon. How could they have overlooked that? This wouldn’t make for three batches, just barely two. Could they go to the store? She was baking, could their father drive them to the store? They’d bring her the cinnamon. Sora’s family had sent them on a journey.

Oh.

“Do you remember?” Sora asked while handing him the plate. His hands took it mechanically, his eyes looked at the cookie pyramid but couldn’t  _ see _ it, his mind wasn’t here. It was ten years behind, on Sora’s dad, their car, Sora taking the front seat because he was old enough for it now, and being so proud of it, too. It had been snowing so much that day, he didn’t know how Sora’s dad had managed to see the road through the windshield, because all he could focus on was the beauty and delicacy of the snowflakes.

His hands trembled. He put the plate down onto the table before inadvertently dropping it.

“Did you know we’ve never baked since then?”

He sat down on the closest chair to himself, his pulse faltering, his pressure dropping. His vision threatened to darken and wipe the world out entirely.

“You were in the car.” Voice shaky, barely present. A reflection of his current state of mind.

“Yeah, I was.”

He looked at Sora, eyes wider than humanly possible.

“What do you remember?”

“Everything.”

“Tell me what happened.”

“I couldn’t sleep for three months. When my eyes closed, all I saw was blood.”

“In the car, Sora, what did you see?”

“You, the windshield, the blood, the airbags, everything. Everything. The sound of the glass cracking was so loud, I can still hear it.”

His hands were cold, his body hyperventilated, but his lungs weren’t working. He was choking, slowly choking to death.

“Your arm wasn’t bending in the right place and your hand was next to mine. I took it, I grabbed your fingers, and you were so cold, Riku, I thought you were dead. I thought I had watched you die.”

“You weren’t at the hospital when I woke up.”

“Your parents didn’t let us in. They never saw us again, I guess they’re in Alpena now.”

He hastily wiped at his eyes. When had he started crying?

“I saw you after the surgery. You had a machine over your mouth, breathing for you, and your head was wrapped up. Your arm was in a cast. You looked half dead.”

“How did you get in?”

“Our parents were arguing in the hallway, so I snuck out, and ran, and hid in your room. I wanted to know if you were alive. I  _ needed _ to know if you were alive. A nurse saw me, said you would be asleep for a while, and that I couldn’t stay there. So I left Filbert to look after you instead.”

“Oh my God, I still have him.”

“Really?” Sora grinned wide, bright. “I thought, maybe, your parents had gotten rid of him.”

“No, I didn’t let them.”

“I mean during the coma.”

“Oh.”

“They never got back to us, never told us you had woken up and were okay. Until last week, I thought you were still laying there, just in a different hospital now.”

“I’m sorry, I can’t believe I forgot about you completely. We used to be neighbors.”

“Yeah! You were over all the time. We spent the days in my house, and the nights at yours. Do you remember that? The movie marathons, the gummy bears, the tire swing?”

“The tire swing… It wasn’t ours. We didn’t have it.”

“It was in my backyard. The monkey bars, too.  _ You _ had the treehouse.”

The more Sora talked, the faster the memories rushed back to him, flooding his mind, flashing over his eyes in the speed of light. He remembered everything, he had lived through everything. They had gotten mock married in that treehouse.

“You were my husband.”

“I was!” Sora threw his head back, laughing, delighted. “That was so funny, we were married, and Roxas was the dog! We made him the dog!” Sora laughed some more, his loud cackles echoing down the empty hallway, damn near shaking the walls. Riku grinned.

“I can’t believe I kissed you.”

Sora wiped at his tears, a wide grin still on his face.

“God… Yeah. You mean yesterday, right?”

“Yeah. That was… I mean. I get it now. I get why you were acting the way you were before.”

A small silence fell between them as Sora’s grin lessened and slowly vanished, leaving behind the ghost of a smile on his features. His eyes fell onto the cookie platter.

“Sorry for baking these, but, I just, I needed you to remember.”

“Thank you for that.”

Their eyes met, and Sora grinned again, more brilliantly than before.

“Am I still your husband?”

He laughed.

“Yeah, of course you are.”

“Do you remember the broken arm thing now? The green cast that you asked me about.”

A slight crease formed between his brows as he fell in thought. He remembered the cast, in Thunder Bay, after having woken up from the coma. Had he woken up with it? No, he couldn’t have. He had been perfectly fine upon opening his eyes, just fragile from lack of exercise, his legs too weak to stand and his body aching all over. He didn’t remember a cast during physiotherapy, either, just a wheelchair and a lot of time spent trying to stand and failing multiple times and, oh. He had fallen on his arm, yeah. Yeah, that had been it. Delicate from the crash, his arm had broken when he fell over it, thus the cast to mend the bones back together.

“It happened in our time apart.”

“Right.” A pause. “So you’re going back to Alpena tomorrow?”

“Yes.”

“When we come back from the holidays, are we, like… Are we going to be different, now that you remember? I mean, I guess we can’t start over anymore.”

“Well, I don’t think the past changes what we have right now. I still like you, Sora, despite knowing your entire backstory.”

Sora squinted playfully at him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

He grinned, getting up from his seat, in order to envelop Sora in a big hug. The brunette fit perfectly into his arms, and, this time, it felt right. More so than before, it felt like this was what he was meant to do, to be close to Sora again, like this. Sora hugged him back in full, squeezing his torso and grinning into his neck. He buried his face into his best friend’s hair, breathed in deep, and kissed it.

“I missed you.” He whispered.

Sora hugged him tighter.

“I’ll never miss you again.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading!


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